I firmly believe the responsibility for the despicable action, in Salisbury, can be laid at the door of the Russian State!
The act itself was carried by the GRU apparatus (Russian Military Intelligence) with the order coming from the highest levels - almost certainly Putin himself,
A case was carefully, and efficiently, constructed, by the UK authorities, and the two GRU operatives were eventually identified.
Nevertheless, IMO those who have followed the news about the event, like myself, might well be surprised at what appears to be a certain level of incompetence on the part of the GRU.
I'm not going into details, but I believe the action could have ben carried out with a great deal more subtlety.
It could well be argued the nature of the action was a deliberate ploy, by the Russians, to make clear to the West the strength of their power, and their contempt for the likely weakness of any response.
They were surprised, however, by the support The UK received from Western allies, and especially the US. This response, apparently, was against the wishes of Trump.
The only way to stop the Russians is to make clear to them any further actions, of this type, will cost them more than any perceived benefit they gain.
If they carry on they should be identified as a "rogue" state.
NB. According to Wikipedia the GRU was founded in 1921. I understand the department was particularly active during the time of Josef Stalin.

What we know at the moment points towards the attempted murder of Sergei Skripal and his daughter by the Russians. However we do not have enough hard evidence to prove this in a court of law. What I cannot get my head around, is the inevitable political fall out, from such a messy attempt to murder some one with the Novichok nerve agent. A home invasion or a mugging gone wrong would have been much easier to perform, and less likely to bring the heat down on the Russians.

What we know at the moment points towards the attempted murder of Sergei Skripal and his daughter by the Russians. However we do not have enough hard evidence to prove this in a court of law. What I cannot get my head around, is the inevitable political fall out, from such a messy attempt to murder some one with the Novichok nerve agent. A home invasion or a mugging gone wrong would have been much easier to perform, and less likely to bring the heat down on the Russians.

They don't give a stuff. The idea was to send a frightening message to any would-be defectors. It was the same with Litvinenko and the polonium. They have always done this, right back to bumping off Trotsky with an ice axe - in Mexico, where there isn't any ice. The whole point was to use a method that pointed directly to the Russian secret service, to scare people. All the denials are routine and they know nobody believes them, except the rabble of loyalist at home, whose allegiance will make them seize on anything purporting to exonerate the regime, however preposterous.

The message from Putin's Kremlin is always the same, whether it be in exotic assassination methods, interference with other countries' politics, undeclared invasions of other countries, or even state-organised cheating in sport. They don't give a stuff and they want the rest of the world to know it. It is a display of ultimate cynicism.

They don't give a stuff. The idea was to send a frightening message to any would-be defectors. It was the same with Litvinenko and the polonium. They have always done this, right back to bumping off Trotsky with an ice axe - in Mexico, where there isn't any ice. The whole point was to use a method that pointed directly to the Russian secret service, to scare people. All the denials are routine and they know nobody believes them, except the rabble of loyalist at home, whose allegiance will make them seize on anything purporting to exonerate the regime, however preposterous.

The message from Putin's Kremlin is always the same, whether it be in exotic assassination methods, interference with other countries' politics, undeclared invasions of other countries, or even state-organised cheating in sport. They don't give a stuff and they want the rest of the world to know it. It is a display of ultimate cynicism.

Exactly their game!
Now they are attempting to create closer relations with China.
Despite a certain amount of suspicion between the two, in the past, their political systems have much in common.
Both regard the West as an ideological and military opponent.
Perhaps "enemy" might be the better word.

They don't give a stuff. The idea was to send a frightening message to any would-be defectors. It was the same with Litvinenko and the polonium. They have always done this, right back to bumping off Trotsky with an ice axe - in Mexico, where there isn't any ice. The whole point was to use a method that pointed directly to the Russian secret service, to scare people. All the denials are routine and they know nobody believes them, except the rabble of loyalist at home, whose allegiance will make them seize on anything purporting to exonerate the regime, however preposterous.

The message from Putin's Kremlin is always the same, whether it be in exotic assassination methods, interference with other countries' politics, undeclared invasions of other countries, or even state-organised cheating in sport. They don't give a stuff and they want the rest of the world to know it. It is a display of ultimate cynicism.

Exactly their game!
Now they are attempting to create closer relations with China.
Despite a certain amount of suspicion between the two, in the past, their political systems have much in common.
Both regard the West as an ideological and military opponent.
Perhaps "enemy" might be the better word.

The strategy of giving the world the finger continues today, with the suspects being interviewed on Russia Today (a Kremlin TV channel directed at the outside world) and claiming they were just tourists, visiting the historic city of Salisbury.

Tourists who spent 2 days in the UK, arriving at Gatwick, staying at a hotel in the East end of London, miles from Waterloo, visiting Salisbury one day, and again the next, were clocked by CCTV in the residential road close to Skripal's house and flew out from Heathrow the same evening the Skripals were found collapsed from novichock poisoning. Unaccountably, traces of novichok were found in the room of the East End hotel.......

The reason they gave for cutting short their Salisbury visit the first day was there was too much snow, so they went back the following day. These are Russians.

The whole exercise is a massive f*** you to everyone, combined with the sort of threadbare claim of innocence that might just about do for an already committed Putin lover, such as some of these neofascists in Italy and Hungary.

Sergei Skripal was a traitor to Russia and like all other Russian traitors, he knew his life was in jeopardy. The most worrying thing about this, is how far the Russians can go, before we say, " enough is enough or we go to war " and then we do go to war.

Sergei Skripal was a traitor to Russia and like all other Russian traitors, he knew his life was in jeopardy. The most worrying thing about this, is how far the Russians can go, before we say, " enough is enough or we go to war " and then we do go to war.

Nobody sane is going to go to war over a handful of assassinations of nobodies. But it will damage relations and increase sanctions and jack up the rhetoric.

Sergei Skripal was a traitor to Russia and like all other Russian traitors, he knew his life was in jeopardy. The most worrying thing about this, is how far the Russians can go, before we say, " enough is enough or we go to war " and then we do go to war.

Nobody sane is going to go to war over a handful of assassinations of nobodies. But it will damage relations and increase sanctions and jack up the rhetoric.

Dave, the first sentence of your post could be interpreted as an attempt not to justify but to reduce, or lower, the level of criminality inherent in extra-judicial killing.
The same could be said about the use of the phrase "assassinations of nobodies".

Sergei Skripal was a traitor to Russia and like all other Russian traitors, he knew his life was in jeopardy. The most worrying thing about this, is how far the Russians can go, before we say, " enough is enough or we go to war " and then we do go to war.

Nobody sane is going to go to war over a handful of assassinations of nobodies. But it will damage relations and increase sanctions and jack up the rhetoric.

Dave, the first sentence of your post could be interpreted as an attempt not to justify but to reduce, or lower, the level of criminality inherent in extra-judicial killing.
The same could be said about the use of the phrase "assassinations of nobodies".

I'm just being a realist. You don't go to war because of an attempted assassination on your soil, of people with no special significance for the country. That would be just nuts. If they assassinated the monarch or a senior government minister that might be different.

It's a fair point Halliday .It is wrong to describe anybody as a "nobody" unless the context is very clear as it can be seen to describe their lack of essential worthiness and not just their relative unimportance in society's hierarchy.

It as been said that democracies don't tend to go to war with each other.If the fabric of the Western and other democracies is starting to fray that would seem to be a worrying trend.

This acceptance of the idea of being a "traitor" to one's country of birth has the ring of apostasy as applied by the some religions where punishments can be extreme I believe.

Sergei Skripal was a traitor to Russia and like all other Russian traitors, he knew his life was in jeopardy. The most worrying thing about this, is how far the Russians can go, before we say, " enough is enough or we go to war " and then we do go to war.

Nobody sane is going to go to war over a handful of assassinations of nobodies. But it will damage relations and increase sanctions and jack up the rhetoric.

Dave, the first sentence of your post could be interpreted as an attempt not to justify but to reduce, or lower, the level of criminality inherent in extra-judicial killing.
".